How I Became Nicole X

Technically, I suppose it happened when I got married. Officially, when I went to the threadbare Social Security Administration and then the bustling southwest DC DMV to change my name. Those events don't mean that when you walk into a meeting at work with clients that you'll remember to say, "Nicole X" instead of "Nicole C"

Wednesday morning I woke up, as usual taking my time to get out of bed. I was still feeling the effects of the near-sleepless night from my dog being sick the night before. I talked to my husband, drank the cup of coffee that he made for me every morning, and went to work. I didn't eat breakfast, which happened occasionally, but didn't think anything of it. When I came to work, I chatted with my co-workers, discussed a couple of projects we needed to get done, and ate a couple handfuls of granola. Everything seemed normal.

At about 11am, I felt a little dizzy. When I haven't eaten this happens occasionally, but it didn't stop. The dizziness continued until I couldn't see and everything stopped for a minute. The only thing I could think was, I needed to call in my co-worker, Melissa. Melissa. Melissa. Finally I got to the point where I could say it. "Melissa." She didn't hear me at first, so I called again. "Melissa."

When she came in, I still had my coat on because as usual, our offices were cold. My heart was racing. I put my head down on the desk and she started fanning me. The world seemed to spin a bit and I was breathing heavily. After a few minutes I calmed down and we talked about it, and even called the on-campus health center. "How old are you?" they asked. "30," I said. "Did you eat breakfast?" they said. "No," I said, a bit sheepishly. "Well, eat something and see how you feel." So I did. Melissa and I took our lunch break, she heated up my food, I ate, and felt a little better. I went back to work on whatever it was I was doing. An hour later, however, I still didn't feel quite right and decided to go home for the rest of the day. On the way home I thought that I might still need some more calories, so I got a smoothie. It was pouring down rain, I remember, as I was paying the meter for the car. I got the smoothie, debated getting a cookie and decided I didn't want the extra expense, and drove home. At least I assume I drove home, I don't really recall driving home now.

B. had the day off from his federal job for Veteran's Day. He might be able to fill in what happened a little more at this point, but I went upstairs to rest and slept. He checked on my heart several times and it seemed to be elevated still, but would go back to normal at times as well. He brought me flowers, marigolds from our garden, and put them in one of the white coffee cups on my bedtable as I was resting.

It seems that when I woke up, we decided to order pizza. At some point, I was on the floor in the fetal position. At another point I said to call our friend Kate, who is a nurse, and she said I could be having a panic attack. "I feel like I'm dying," I said. That was a symptom of a panic attack, she thought. We ate pizza. Then about 30 minutes after that I started vomiting.

Now, you would think that at some point we would have thought, "Gee, we might need to go to the hospital." My husband was worried we would go there and sit for six hours before anyone took care of us. Since I don't remember much of the evening, I can't really follow my decision making process but I knew that in the past when I had episodes of vomiting (usually after a night of drinking too much), if I could just fall asleep right after I threw up, I would stop. This time I would wake up to throw up again. It was terrifying. At about 4am, we decided to go to Sibley Hospital.